Chapter Text
Five
When the seven of them were dumped out of the space-time vortex, Five felt like he'd been put through a blender along with several sharp knives, three tons of gravel, and a banana for good measure. He had only gone backwards in time once before, and that had felt like the hangover to end all hangovers. But with seven people along for the ride, it felt like the universe had just chewed him into a pulp before spitting his lifeless body into... Oh, shit. The Icarus Theater all over again. Now that his vision was returning, he realized that the seven of them had dropped right onto the stage that had been covered in rubble moments before. Only now, a new orchestra seemed to be in the middle of a performance. Or had been. The music had come to a grinding halt, the entire theater turning their attention to the pile of bodies that had just appeared out of nowhere.
Five staggered to his feet, disturbed by the weakness in his scrawny, thirteen-year-old legs. The room spun like a merry-go-round, but there wasn't time to address that particular problem. He noticed that his siblings were still adults. Interesting. They had gone through several age warps during the transition, but it seemed adulthood had stuck... For everyone except him. Five couldn't help but be jealous. He had been looking forward to evening the playing field, height-wise. Mentally, he kicked himself. This wasn't what he should be focusing on right now. "Guys, get up," he said to his siblings. His words slurred slightly. Security guards were working their way up the aisle. They needed to get out of here.
To his surprise, (and annoyance) everyone else seemed to be in much better shape than him. They were slower to get their bearings, but once they did they were much less wobbly. Vanya was still unconscious, but Luther didn't seem to have a problem carrying her. Must be the protein. Or the mutant gorilla DNA. Five had thought they would have more trouble getting used to the transition, seeing as they were newbies to time travel, Klaus being the exception. Apparently, doing the work of dragging everyone here was much more taxing than simply coming along for the ride, inexperienced or not. Five lurched forward. Allison caught him, but just barely. "Are you alright?" she asked, sounding infuriatingly like a mother. He shook her off.
"We need to go," he said. By now the perplexed musicians had rushed off the stage, instruments in hand, and the security guards were upon them. The audience was being ushered out of the theater, and Five was pretty sure he could hear police sirens.
A man who had the air of the person in charge approached them, taser drawn. The rest of the guards were a few yards away, fanned out in a V-formation. "Alright, let's just calm down. Put down the girl, and step away from the kid. Everyone, put your hands in the air."
Five felt a migraine coming on top of the one he already had. Double-decker, like they did it in England. So now he and Vanya were hostages, and the rest of them were terrorists. If he could just jump out of here this didn't have to be an issue, but there was no way in hell that was happening. Even worse, he could barely string together coherent sentences, and he didn't trust anyone else to talk their way out of this. Except... "Allison," he said. But she had already caught on.
She backed away from Five and put her hands in the air. "I heard a rumor you're going to tell your men to leave the theater," she said in a perfectly calm, reasonable tone. She made steady eye contact with the boss.
The guard blinked, then cleared his throat and turned to the other guards. "Men! Leave the building immediately!" They hesitated, confused. "That was an order! Do it now!" With that, the baffled security guards lowered their weapons and hurried down the aisles. Allison smiled and approached the leader, who was now looking very confused at his sudden solitude.
"I heard I rumor you're going to go outside and tell everyone that there's no one here and that nothing happened." He immediately obeyed, helpless before his sister's commands. Really, Allison was more terrifying than people gave her credit for.
"Good work," he said, swaying slightly. "Now... Have to get out of here..."
"Are you alright?" Diego asked, as much of a mom as Allison.
"Fine," he said, glaring at everyone. Unfortunately, just as he said that he collapsed. Not very convincing, even he had to admit. Klaus squawked slightly as he hit the floor, and they all gathered around him. Mother hens, the lot of them. Disgusting. "You... idiots," he coughed. "We need to go! Now!"
"Hate to break it to you, Five, but I don't think we're the ones holding up that process at the moment," Klaus said. Five hated it when his idiot brothers were right. Now deeply aggravated, he did his best to stand up, knees shaking violently as he did so.
"Oh, for Christ's sake," Diego said, rolling his eyes. He picked up Five and slung him over his shoulders like a sack of potatoes. He let out a muffled shout of protest, but was too weak to do anything about it. Vertigo got worse when your upside down, funnily enough.
"...Kill you..." he muttered, head lolling slightly.
"Uhh, should we take him to a hospital?" Klaus asked, poking at Five's cheek. Never before had a thirteen-year-old looked so murderous.
"No hospitals, idiots... Run..." He moaned. The one guard's protests wouldn't hold off the police for long.
"He's right, Klaus," Ben said from the corner. "He's probably just spent from the whole time traveling thing." At the sound of Ben's voice, everyone jumped but Klaus. At the sight of everyone's eyes on him, Ben flushed, not used to the attention. Five supposed that for a long time, only Klaus could hear him. "We can talk about my sudden resurrection later," he said. "We need to go." It was nice to have another pragmatist around.
"And how do we get out of here?" asked Klaus. "Seeing as we're in the possession of one conscious individual and one mostly unconscious one that both bear a striking resemblance to freshly murdered corpses, I wouldn't suggest trying to stroll right on by the police barricade that has undoubtedly been set up outside."
"There's a back door," Allison said. "Right over there. I... Used to come here with Vanya to watch the performances."
Everyone looked uneasily at Vanya, who looked so peaceful in her sleep. Vanya, the harbinger of the apocalypse, the seventh (and not so ordinary!) member of the academy, and their sister. All six of them had done her wrong. They had a lot to talk about when she woke up. But for now, they had to run. They hurried down the stage's steps, Allison leading the way to the back exit. Five cursed as his head bounced up and down, slamming into Diego's back. To everyone's immense relief, no one waited outside the exit.
"Where to now?" Luther asked, clearly anxious to be the leader despite his cluelessness. Five didn't have time for his brother's superiority complex.
"Away," Five said. "Can't let the police see us..." They moved a few blocks before coming to Markle Public Park, only a few minutes away from the Academy. At that point, no one really knew what to do. On top of that, they were accumulating a lot of stares from civilians. Five glared daggers at every concerned mother who looked his way.
"Hold on a minute," said Klaus. "We need to readjust. We look a bit strange."
"Ya think?" Five groaned, basking in his own indignity from his place over Diego's shoulder. "Not much we can do about that."
"No, there's definitely room for improvement. First of all, Luther, give Vanya to Allison. It looks a lot less rape-y."
"Excuse me!?" Luther sputtered, going from zero to tomato-faced in about two seconds.
"He's right," Allison said. "Here, put her on the bench, I'll sit with her." Awkwardly, Luther handed over his unconscious sister to the awake one. The two women looked almost natural, one resting her head on the other's shoulder, perhaps in the middle of an afternoon nap. The white suit was a bit strange, but oh well.
"Good," Klaus said. "Now, Diego. I want less man-in-all-black-leather kidnapping roofied child, and more fun dad at the park, okay? Let's switch from fireman carry to piggyback." Diego rolled his eyes at Klaus's phrasing but obliging shifting Five onto his back. He helped back a yelp of pain at the transition. "Good! Five, look happier." Five glowered with such an intensity that flowers might've wilted. "Or... Not. I guess the baby's having a temper tantrum today. It works. Now we look slightly less conspicuous." He made a mental note to kill Klaus when he had the time and strength.
"We look exactly the same," Luther said, still a little huffy.
"And that's the kind of restrictive thinking that makes you a no-fun stick-in-the-mud," said Klaus.
"Okay, break it up," Ben said. Once again, everyone flinched at his words. He looked slightly embarrassed, but cleared his throat and continued. "Where do we go now? We've been dumped seventeen years in the past, in our adult bodies. There's a good chance the police are after us, and Five might be dying."
"Not... dying," gasped Five. "And you're one to complain... About seventeen years in the past, in our adult bodies... Mister dead for seven years..." To think he had managed to literally raise the dead, and all he got in return was complaints!
"Yeah, yeah, eternally grateful, we'll get to that later," said Ben. "So where do we go now?"
"The Academy?" Luther said, his voice almost hopeful.
"Because Father Dearest will be so happy to invite Gorilla Man, Ms. Destructo, my fabulous self, and the rest of this misfit toy ensemble into his humble home," scoffed Klaus. "He'll have us dissected, arrested, or at the very least emotionally disturbed before we've even finished saying hello."
"He wouldn't do that," Luther said.
"Again, you mean?" said Klaus.
"No, Luther, you're right," Diego said. "He'll skip the formalities and have us shipped straight to the moon before anyone can see what failures his precious Umbrella Academy become in the future."
"Stop it, all of you!" Allison shouted. "Fighting won't get anything done. Vanya's going to wake up soon, and when she does, we need to have some semblance of a plan. And that starts with figuring out where we're going to stay until we know what the hell we're going to do. Alright?"
They all stood in silence for a moment, until Klaus spoke up.
"Well," he said uncertainly. "I know a motel."